


A Shepherdess and Her Ranger

by i_luv_obiwan91



Category: The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Alternate Universe, Courtship, Drama, F/M, Father-Daughter Relationship, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-02
Updated: 2015-02-02
Packaged: 2018-03-10 03:22:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 17,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3274826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/i_luv_obiwan91/pseuds/i_luv_obiwan91
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A shepherdess living with her father meets a kind ranger who trades his services for the price of a goat. From such beginnings a new life comes with their binding and, through loss and tragedy, the herdswoman renews her hope in love.</p>
<p>Couple of pairings, no love triangles. Story skirts around the details of the War of the Ring, but follows the timeline and main canon plot.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One

“What’s your price for a milk goat, good woman?” The man approached from a path at the edge of her fields and a dog ran up to him, wary of the stranger.

Bryn looked him over, reading that he was one of the rangers, but discerned that he held no ill intent in his manner. “My milking girls are all pregnant, the price will be higher for the kid along with the mother.” She spoke calmly, reasoning payment with him.

“I need the goat for my comrade’s wife, who’s just born a child and is not well. The coin I have will be enough, I hope.” Drawing nearer once she had commanded the guard dog to ease off, he showed her a few brass coins that she regarded along with his explanation. Seeing she would need convincing, the ranger gestured to the wide fields that held her flocks. “I can add the service of my protection for your property, as long as a month?” The signs of relent were on her face now, and he knew that this service was needed. “I saw the carcasses as I came down from the hills. The orcs have taken from your herds, have they harmed you or your family?”

Straightening, Bryn debated on whether to tell him or not, and at length decided to put her trust in him. Any wagging tongue could spread dangerous tales about the rangers in a tavern, but she believed them to be of good will. “It is only a matter of time. I live with my father, who carries old wounds, and my animals have been the brunt of the raids thus far. We’ve lost a dozen, at least, goats and sheep over the last couple weeks.”

Her admission heartened him to her, and his grey eyes regarded the shepherdess with respect. She had done her part in defending their land, but only so much could be done. “Then I shall return, and keep close to seek out the beasts.” His words were as good as an oath by the manner in which he spoke, and the woman nodded after gazing long on him.

“Come, I’ll bring you one of my sturdier girls. You rangers are farther north, yes? This one will be hardy through the winter.” At his nod, she led him through the flock and jogged after a fatter ewe with chiming metals at her neck that tried to evade her. Strong hands took hold of its blunt horns and, smiling, she half dragged the animal to him. “Named her Tryst, and she’ll let anything cover her, so if you’re wanting more kids out of this one, tell your captain to just bring her by when she’s in heat and I’ll let the rams have a go.”

With a flushed laugh, the ranger fisted his hands in the wool where she had placed hers to hold the goat, and their eyes met kindly. “I’m Ancalon.”

A smile in her blue eyes, she nodded. “Bryn.” Their hands touched when he passed her the few coins and she put them in her skirt pocket before reaching out to clasp his hand. “When you come back, find me again and I’ll introduce you to my father.”

“I’ll find you.” His grin put a blush on her cheeks that talking of ewes in heat had not even done. The goat complained a few times as he pulled her along and back onto the path, and Bryn watched with her hand up to shield the sun for a few minutes longer, finally turning back to the field with a lingering warmth on her face.

 

It was a week later when Ancalon came within view again, striding down the slope that rose behind their small home. The afternoon sun was warm, though an autumn breeze did its best to remind them that cold weather was coming. Bryn went out to meet him and led him the rest of the way inside the cottage and to where her father sat finishing his meal. He was warmly welcomed, for Bryn’s father was a good man, more thankful to have his daughter with him than to be bitter over crippling wounds. “Why don’t we sit out on the porch, while the sun is out? I shall miss it when the days are dark and cold.” The older man suggested, and Ancalon was quick to put an arm around to help him to a chair Bryn brought for his use.

“You’ll do good to soak up the warmth, sir.” The ranger agreed, smiling with sympathy at the sire who obviously still carried great pain in movement. A grimace covered his face when he’d brought him out, and Ancalon noted that his feet could not move on their own, though he tried to help with his legs. What strength and long-suffering his daughter must have to take care of him all this time.

Recovered at length, the elder man clapped the ranger on his shoulder and grasped his neck. “We shall see you often, while you patrol, I hope. And no more of these ‘sir’ s and ‘master’s toward me. I am Ake, and you shall call me so.” They both laughed, Ake’s louder than the younger man, but both calmed the mirth when Bryn came out to bring them both some strong drink. “And do not call my dear child ‘Bryn’ as she would have it. Her mother named her Brynhilde, which more closely matches the beauty of my daughter, do you not think?”

The woman in question sent her father a pleading look, blushing prettily when she caught the gaze of Ancalon who smiled fondly to know her true name. “Either one will do.” She murmured, not truly discounting her father who clearly worshipped her. She sat now at their feet, her legs dangling off the elevated porch and her back leaning against a support post, allowing her to face them while Ancalon stood talking long with her father amiably.

“Have you a family, Ancalon? A wife in the north, waiting for you?” Bold as one grows with years, Ake asked the young man what he would, and watched his discomfort with a wink to his daughter.

“No, sir. There’s not many women would like a ranger for a husband, I think. The life is dangerous, and we’re not often settled.”

“Just need a good strong, independent lass, is all.” Ake beamed with a smile up at the young man for a moment long enough for Ancalon to look away, smirking. That mirth was sapped from his expression in an instant as the ranger’s keen eye spotted something. Ake turned to try and find it as well. “What is it, lad?”

Brynhilde looked up from where she had let her gaze wander and landed her eyes on the same thing. At once, she stood and came to her father, looking for confirmation from Ancalon. Turning to her briefly, he nodded. “Go inside, both of you.” With watchful eyes returned to where the threat lay, he listened to the man and daughter make their way inside, a bar laid over the door from the inside and he was satisfied.

When had the sun become obscured? Was it already so close to evening that they had talked so long? The ranger crouched slowly and then, staying close to the ground, made his way to the nearer trees so to keep hidden. Only a little movement had caught his attention, but then the fixed glowing eyes of an enemy remained hovering at the edge of the wooded darkness further in. They remained unmoving, but as he drew closer, he could see the yellow orbs blink every now and then. Only one was not good… there were undoubtedly more elsewhere. Perhaps this one was to watch the homestead while others were around to steal more animals.

Having seated her father just inside the door, Bryn stood still as a tree and one eye peaked out from their front window. Ake clasped her skirts with one hand convulsively, his eyes distantly pointed toward the far wall, yet without focus. Brynhilde’s sight was still fixed upon those two eyes, which haunted the border of their woods. In her dreadful watch, she had nearly missed Ancalon’s stealthy movements and now searched for him amidst the brush and young trees leading outward into denser forest. When she caught sight of him at last, she realized he was flanking the orc, catching him at an angle, so that if it saw him, its attention would be diverted from the house. She murmured a breathless prayer to protect him.

“He’ll be all right, my love.” Glancing down at her father, she found his eyes upon her and his hand reached for her own instead of her skirt, stroking his thumb across her knuckles once she was in his grasp.

“You don’t really want me to marry a ranger, do you, Dad?” The question was supposed to tease him, but the fear that she felt could not be kept from her whispered voice.

Wordless for a moment, the man pulled her down to kneel beside him and kissed her hand sweetly, pressing it to his chest. “He seems very selfless to me, which is to be desired in a spouse. But he will have to realize the worth of his own life.” Ake looked his daughter in the eye now. “If you come to love him, he will have to learn the importance of his return from every venture.” The woman nodded, feeling very vulnerable now, and laid her head at her father’s leg, distantly feeling his hand stroke her curls while her eyes shut tight in miserable waiting.

They both jolted when the inhuman shriek came echoing against the house, and a heartbeat later two more answering shouts were roared distant from the other side of their property. Brynhilde shot up and went to the window at the opposite wall, peering out cautiously until the bleating of goats and their dangling noise-makers were heard scattering away from predators and the dogs’ barking and growling drew closer. Footsteps were coming from the direction Ancalon had gone and soon around the little house Bryn saw him come running, sheathing a sword that now carried black stains and drawing his bow with an arrow pointed low.

Two hunched figures came now from the top of the hill into sight and Brynhilde could see one of her dogs still attacking them, aiming for the one who appeared to limp the most. Perhaps her other hounds had got him. Where were they? Her stomach clenched at the thought. Having lost the ranger to his skill blending into the gloam past sunset, the woman flinched in surprise when an arrow silently found the orc’s head that her dog had been attacking. The thing fell like a tree to the ground and the other orc panicked, looking about him with jerking movements as he swatted at her dog that now leapt after him. The beast began running straight for the house, tumbling down the hill haphazardly, and eventually tripping when another arrow landed in its back. Momentum carried the body for a bit further until a young tree stopped its progress and the carcass lay still.

Brynhilde moved from where she had crouched transfixed by the window and passed her father with a fleeting touch on his shoulder as she unblocked their door and ran outside. Without heed to the old man’s call of her name, the woman came around the back of the house and started running up the hill with surefooted speed. “Ancalon!”

The ranger emerged from the trees that hid him, having seen her coming, and took hold of her arm. “Are you all right? You should be inside with your father—“

“You’re bleeding.” She spied darkness at his hairline, which she could recognize even in the growing night.

“It’s nothing. Go back to the house, Brynhilde, I must make certain things are safe.” His tone held more authority this time, and gently he pushed her in that direction. Quietly, she looked at him before conceding and jogging back to her father who waited worriedly.

Saying nothing, Bryn only touched her father’s shoulder as she came in and bolted the door again, going straight to the fire that had been ebbing away. As she encouraged it to burn brightly again, Brynhilde looked over her shoulder at him and ran a weary hand through her hair. “You can be certain, now, that I will _not_ be marrying a ranger.”


	2. Two

Against her father’s pleading, Bryn arose early and took her rod to check on the flocks, praying on her hike that few had been harmed and that her dogs yet lived. Many of the sheep had come into the corral that offered some shelter in the winter months, but she found the bloody stains of at least two animals on her way to the higher field. There were no remains. The goats she found mostly together in a thicket still lying low from a watchful slumber. Two kids had been born in the night and she checked them with loving hands to see that they were healthy and untouched by danger.

Her nose met the acrid smoke of a necessary fire and as she continued, she soon came upon Ancalon and the pile of at least five orcs burning down to bones. He sat cross-legged with his back to her and the white fur of one of her dogs in his lap. “Ancalon?” She came near and he turned his head to see her with a tired smile. He was petting the hound soothingly, and there were bandages on his left hind leg. “Is he all that’s left?” The woman sat beside him and stroked her animal’s head and cheeks with care.

“One I found slain, and the other I think has gone his way to die, no doubt badly wounded.” He watched her tenderly treat the dog as he perked up and received his mistress’ attentions, weakly lifting his tail to brush the ranger’s leg. “This fellow has a broken leg that I’ve set. But he will need to stay with your father to keep him company while he heals.”

Nodding, Bryn looked up at him as dawn illuminated his weary face and she could see the lines and scars. Blood had dried on his head where she mentioned last night he had been hurt, and her hand rose to turn him by the chin so that she might examine the wound. “You need to let me tend to that.” Speaking softly, her eyes returned to meet his steady gaze and she took a shaky breath. “ _Thank you_.”

He merely inclined his head, watching her a few moments longer as she lowered her eyes. How had he not noticed the blue in them? Following her movements, Ancalon saw her produce a small flask and clean cloth from her satchel, wetting it and coming around to kneel at his other side. One hand, strong and feminine, took a gentle hold of his bearded chin while the other cleaned the wound on his head with tenderness. “I’ve a salve at the house to put on this cut, but it doesn’t need stitches. You’ll have quite a bruise there.” Finished for the moment, the lady sat back on her heels and addressed him again.

Nodding his thanks, he agreed. “Yes, I feel the bruise quite a bit.” They kept their voices low, as though dawn and a sleeping dog required it of them. A smile was shared between the two, but it faltered when Bryn’s gaze was drawn over to the burning pile a little ways off. Noting her disquiet, Ancalon answered the unspoken question. “I didn’t want to tell you last night to frighten you… There were several more covered by darkness closer to the far edge of the fields. I checked the surrounding land, as well.”

She looked grimly at the burn pile, few remnants left to distinguish as orc except for the lingering smell. “I doubted last night, and I should not have questioned your caution. I was eager to check the animals, and I’d have fallen to harm if you’d not made me go back in.” A sigh left her.

“I’ll be more open with you, from now on. Only I had seen your fear, Brynhilde, and did not wish to increase it.” He watched as a little tension left her when he spoke her name.

“Will you not come to the house? Bring my good dog, I’ll put the salve for your cut.” Only a glance was given him, but Ancalon responded by rising with the animal in arms and followed the woman back down the hill.

 

When Bryn stood watching her flocks, now, Ancalon often was with her. Ake knew of it and smiled warmly in approval, but the young adults were simply at ease to talk and be in the company of a friend. Both of them had grown unknowingly used to loneliness and relaxed in the presence of another quiet soul.

Ancalon laughed in disbelief one cool morning when Brynhilde delivered a new kid, holding it close and cleaning it with her aprons as a blanket while the mama goat licked her young. The ranger looked on her admiringly, sitting in the damp grass with a smile on her flushed face and her breath fogging before her. He found himself very often agreeing with Ake’s descriptions of her beauty. When she asked if he’d like to take the newborn kid, he blinked and answered belatedly. “I don’t know how to hold it.”

The woman laughed at the weak excuse, pushing the little goat into his arms. “It’s just like holding a baby, Ancalon.” She encouraged gently and fixed the apron around the ‘baby’ as he cradled it to his chest, leaving a hand on him as her other one pet and rubbed warmth into the little bundle. Catching him watching her while her attention had been on the kid, Bryn looked down with a deeper blush and removed her hand from his forearm, returning to the mama goat who was pacing again as though still in labor. “Someone’s not done.”

It was a few minutes more and soon another baby goat came into the light of dawn, bleating weakly, and he was indeed small. Ancalon noticed how carefully Bryn handled this one; less with the fond rubbing she had given the firstborn and instead more delicately, as though not to break it. “What’s the matter?” He asked, kneeling down beside her.

“He’s just much smaller than his sister. I’m thinking I might keep him inside until he’s strong enough to take these morning frosts.” Brynhilde looked to him with a furrow between her brows, silently asking his advice, to which he gave a nod in agreement. The woman took her outer layer of skirt and brought it up to cushion and cover the little goat in her grasp, rising to stand and beckoning to the remaining animal. “Come, little mother. Let’s bring your babies home.” They walked slowly back to the house and little barn where the mother and stronger kid would stay for a while, remarking between them how Ancalon had been so surprised, the difference in what Bryn had always been accustomed to and what was new to him.

The air between them was calm when they weren’t speaking, but the ranger’s next words were spoken in a more serious tone. “Brynhilde, I’m going to leave soon.”

They kept walking. “I know.” Came softly from her lips.

A few steps further, but then he halted his long strides and caused her to turn back to look at him. “I wanted to ask if I… if it would be _welcome_ for me to return so often as I’m able.” When his eyes were brave enough to meet hers, he found them bright again, a calm smile widening her mouth.

“Aye, it would be well come.”

 

It was midwinter, a few months later, that Ancalon came back to the familiar cottage on the wooded side, finding snow heaped all upon the hill behind the house and a lonely column of smoke rising from their chimney. Ake was sitting warm by the fire when the ranger came in and loaded an armful of extra wood onto their reserve. With laughter, he was welcomed and brought to bend down low for a strong embrace from the old sire. “It is _good_ to see you, Ancalon!” The man pushed him into the seat at his side where Bryn typically sat close, allowing the wrinkled, smiling eyes to regard him for a long moment before he spoke with the blunt kindness that was per usual. “You’re here to ask for her, are you not?” Ancalon laughed softly, caught out. He said nothing, which confirmed Ake’s words. “You’re too thin! _Much_ too thin since you were here before. Brynhilde will add to you, of course, but we must set to remedy that straight away…” His voice jested, but Ancalon saw his eyes remain steadily appraising him in regard to his daughter.

“I would ask permission to pay your daughter court, sir.” The ranger spoke lowly, but met his elder’s gaze respectfully, awaiting his answer.

Ake took a deep breath and exhaled through his nose, ruffling the beard that grew thick on his lips. “You said yourself, when first I met you, that a ranger is not a good husband.”

“I said not many women would desire such a husband… And you replied it would simply take a strong, independent lass.” Ancalon countered, remembering well their conversation for the recitation he’d practiced all the months between then and now.

Ake shrugged and puffed another sigh. “Aye, that’s what I said.” He seemed to regret the words a little, since his daughter so obviously fit that description. “If I allow your courtship, then not only _I_ will be testing you, but my beloved daughter as well, for she is not ruled by feeling so much as to overlook practicality. Already, your actions speak highly of you, but you _did_ say you rangers rarely settle… A husband must be present for his wife.”

“It is true, my life has often been that of the nomad. Yet there are rangers among my brethren who have their families and keep them well guarded, though often they travel to protect others. It is not impossible, for a ranger’s wife to live. And along with the distance, I have seen that their reunions are much sweeter, their spouses and children better loved than so often I see in the villages where always the men remain.”

The elder was silent a moment and turned to look at the fire. “I left my wife and little one to fight, many years ago, to defend them against the enemy.” Ake’s eyes glassed over in remembrance. “I returned wounded, though return I did. But my lover’s face… ‘twas so full of fear that I would never return. It is a feeling I’ve had a very small taste of, seeing my daughter off to her fields every day that might as well be fifty leagues from my reaching her if something were to harm her. I find the taste very _bitter_ , Ancalon. I would not have my daughter’s mouth filled with it every time your duty called you away.”

Nodding solemnly, the ranger understood these protests completely, for they are what had wracked his mind since he begun to think of having Brynhilde as his own. The risk was her decision, however, and Ancalon voiced that to the father.

“Of course it is her decision! And whether I tell you yeah or nay this moment has little, or no say in what my daughter’s response to you will be.” Disgruntled, Ake looked into the fire again, which still blazed happily on. “You ought to go up and tell her of your intentions before I send you away, Ancalon. Already, you are very much a son to me. But these things, you see—as a _father_ —are hard for me to overlook.” A weathered eye watched him before it changed slowly into the smiling gaze of that affectionate Ake once more. Ancalon clasped his hand fervently, and rose to depart again out into the cold to find the lady his heart sought.

She looked like a statue of Minas Tirith, beautiful and still at the crest of the hill that overlooked her flocks. He had come up along the tree-line, out of sight and quietly, so that he was near enough to see her breath turn to fog and fall as frost when she turned to him and trudged through the powdered snow to hug him. They laughed, and Ancalon could not let go of her immediately, finding himself even more smitten with this reality than the one he had imagined all those wandering days alone. “You look well, Brynhilde.” His voice was soft, love laced within the words for her to hear.

“Your beard is thickened.” The woman laughed breathlessly, her eyes a bright blue in contrast to her fair skin and buff winter wrappings. “Yet you are so thin! Have you had no good meat this season?” Those eyes betrayed her concern as she glanced at her arms around him, how easily they wrapped about his waist.

Ancalon’s smile broadened, unconcerned with what was said so long as he could drink in the sight of her. “I’ve eaten well enough. My feet have run many miles since I saw you last, and the distance has eaten at me, as well.” There was a slight worry line between her dark brows and he found himself longing to kiss it smooth.

“Come and sit awhile with me. It is warmer here in the sun.” Her mitten-clad hand laid hold of his and led him to the fallen tree and boulder that had often been their seating when he stayed out in pasture with her. “Tell me of these miles you’ve been running. Where did you travel?” Bryn listened eagerly to his account of where he had been away to, even as far as Rohan, and the comrades he had served with and met as they defended lands from the enemy.

Their eyes lingered long on one another, each taking in every detail that had changed in the months since his departure. At a lull in their conversation, Ancalon reached for her hand and held the soft wool mitt between both of his hands, feeling her warmth seep into his fingers. Shaking his head with a smile, he murmured something in elvish, looking up to find Bryn gazing with a sweet smile quirked in curiosity. “I am glad to have come and bought a milk goat from you.”

The words were spoken earnestly, but the young woman laughed out loud and covered her mouth with her free hand. “What a thing to say, Ancalon, to use such beautiful language for!”

After sharing a smile with her, he glanced down at their hands and spoke something else, longer, and clearer with the Sindarin tongue. Intrigued, she waited for his interpretation and found his eyes intently upon her. “Is it sufficient to express how deep a regard I feel for you, Brynhilde?” He worked at pulling away her mitten until his fingers stroked her bare skin. “I had words with your father and he gave me leave to ask you… if I may begin to court you, Brynhilde.”

The shepherdess seemed caught off guard, but quickly and pleasingly adapted by taking both his hands in her own and bringing them up to warm at her smiling lips. Bryn’s little laugh made a burst of fog around their fingers and sent an excited chill through the ranger. “I am glad you came to buy a milk goat from me.” With a sudden release of laughter, Ancalon lurched forward to hold her and pressed a kiss his lady’s cheek.

 

Ancalon was dutiful in his courtship with the lovely shepherdess, and over time his ranger brothers came to understand why he never returned to the settlements with them between journeys. Brynhilde worried, as was to be expected, every time he left her to go and fight, but her ranger was good to tell her everything he knew before and after a departure into wilderness. Winter passed sweetly in this way, developing a routine of gentle embraces and whispering ‘I will come back to you.’ Promises that he always kept.

Ake found his daughter even stronger than he had believed her to be, with the endurance to wait on her ranger with more fortitude than he had expected. “This cycle of constantly leaving you will give you a lasting pain, my love. I would not have you suffer through such a lifetime of being espoused to this.” Sharing his concerns, he took his daughter by the hands one evening when she had become emotional over Ancalon’s recent leave-taking.

The woman shook her head resiliently, yet loosing a few more tears. “No, father. Life cannot _only_ be happiness, and I know now that if I were to refuse a life with Ancalon… there would be so little for me. To live without him would be to continually eat of that bitter waiting. I _love_ him, father. I’m more than willing to take the good with the bad, I am strong enough.”

Ake wiped away tears of his own and drew his precious daughter into his arms, holding her close as if she were still a little child. “Then I will take him as a son, my dearest Brynhilde, and give you to be his wife.”

When Ancalon returned next, a beautiful, breathless shepherd maiden tackled him to spring-softened earth and embraced him with strong young arms. Bryn buried her face into his neck and breathed him in, feeling his callused hands hold her close at the waist and fingers through her hair. Murmuring against him, he could not understand her, and pushed her away just enough to look at her ruddy face above him. “I want to be your wife, Ancalon. I am ready.” Quietly, she breathed the words and watched as their meaning pierced him like an arrow of relief.

Sitting up suddenly, the ranger held her tight against him and let his mouth hover over hers until they joined together and kissed soundly for a long moment. Releasing her lips only, Ancalon’s grazed her cheek as they pressed their foreheads together. “That is well, Brynhilde, for I am more than ready to be your husband.” With a husky voice, Ancalon spoke with the ease of a tension that had been coiling within him for all the time of their courtship. Released from doubt, he kissed her lips again and lingered even longer than before, parting only to gasp against her skin. “I love you. _Brynhilde, I love you_.”


	3. Three

They talked over details, of where they would live, and how they would live, settling on the decision to build another small house nearby the cottage Bryn currently shared with her father. Once this was built, they would marry. Ake could not be moved without great pain, and their livestock would remain in the family, so these hills and bald fields would become Ancalon’s home. Through all of spring and the beginning of summer, Brynhilde and Ancalon both worked hard to build their first house and make it into what they would share for as many years as the Valar gave them.

When midsummer came, Ake looked out over his daughter’s shoulder and saw the lovely little home situated a stone’s throw from his position on the cottage’s porch, Ancalon’s bare back visible as he worked on carving the last of the railings for his own porch. His gaze moved to his daughter whose eyes were pleasantly regarding her betrothed. “So tomorrow’d be a good day for a wedding, aye?” Brynhilde whirled around to look at her father excitedly, and Ake saw Ancalon’s movements suddenly halt so that the lad turned in their direction. Ake’s laugh boomed across the meadow as his daughter embraced him, and he patted her back affectionately. “It might rain, lass! But that’s good luck, anyhow.”

The woman kissed his cheek and then quickly moved away to run across the grass toward Ancalon, fair leaping into his waiting arms, for he had indeed heard the words of her father. Laughing, he spun them round, hearing her tender words at his ear. “ _Tomorrow_ , my love.”

Though only a few short hours, the wait until morning felt unnecessarily long for the lovers. After a sweet good night Ancalon departed to take his rest in what would the next eve be their bedchamber. Brynhilde watched him until he looked once more at her before closing the door. Her night was spent in methodical preparation of her simple wedding gown, sewing what details she had planned, yet not carried out, and trying it on at least a dozen times to make sure of the fit.

When Ancalon’s hands held her by the waist of that dress the next day, he could not have found her more beautiful than if she were a princess among elves. In the presence of her father, they spoke their oaths to one another, promising enduring love and care. A simple meal was shared afterward before Ake kissed them both with bleary eyes, welcomed his new son, and sent them both away to their new lives in a new little home across the meadow.

 

It was near to a year before Brynhilde met any of her husband’s fellow rangers, having no blood relations and only the brothers of comrades-in-arms, Ancalon had made no great efforts to meet them in this time of being newly wed. He was wrapping his beloved in another layer to ward off the late-winter damp when a polite, but present, knock came to their doorframe. Ancalon bade her to stay put and opened the door enough to recognize the familiar jaw and smirk of his chieftain under the other ranger’s hood. “I thought it was perhaps time to see if one of my rangers still lived.” Stepping inside and casting back his hood to reveal dark, dirty hair and clear grey eyes, Bryn could see how obviously her husband and this man were of the same ilk in their manner. Those piercing eyes glanced over toward her, and then down with pleasant surprise at the swell of her belly. “Living, and living _well_ do I find you, Ancalon.”

Warmly, her husband received his congratulations and held out his hand to beckon the woman into his side. “This is my wife, Brynhilde.” Ancalon spoke with pride and she bowed her head respectfully to her husband’s companion. Gesturing to the ranger, he looked fondly on her and made introduction. “This is captain of our rangers, and leader of our Dúnedain, Strider.”

“Please, my friend, call me as you do among our people. Your lady wife may certainly call me by Estel.” The captain was not at ease to have his titles listed off, and looked kindly to the woman standing close into his friend’s side.

Already Brynhilde liked him, seeing that there was only honor and genuine friendship about his demeanor. “I’m pleased to meet you, Estel. My father lives very near us and is crippled to walk far, else Ancalon would have brought me to meet some of those he has lived with and fought alongside. You are certainly welcome here, any time your travels bring you within reach.”

“I thank you, my lady.” He touched his brow with his fingers in a sign of gratitude and watched as the woman turned to kiss her husband tenderly, her eyes only for him, and murmur something before departing through the same door he had entered through. “She is well worth the year you’ve been away from our rangers, Ancalon. I wish you both a joyful life together.”

Ancalon’s gaze was directed fondly at his front door before his focus returned to the ranger before him. “Thus far it has been only happiness, though we understand it cannot always be so. Brynhilde is more dear to me than anything or anyone I’ve known.”

Estel put a strong hand upon his shoulder and smiled. “As she should be, my friend.”

It was perhaps midday that Brynhilde returned to find her father’s small home filled with the laughter of men. She opened the door to have welcome heat meet her from a roaring fire in Ake’s little hearth and three red-faced gentlemen who each peered up at her with broad smiles as she shut the cold out. “Someone has been serving the last of our honey mead.” Smirking in amusement, she met her father’s gaze and received an unrepentant wink, followed by a bubbling laugh that could not be withheld. Estel soon joined him again in that laughter, though his was not so wild.

Ancalon rose and welcomed his wife with an embrace, disrobing of a few cold garments, and a long kiss full of warmth quite welcome to her cold nose and cheeks. “I saved aside a little for future use.” He whispered as though conspiring with her, and she laughed gently at him, putting her hands on his chest.

“Good times with friends are little to be had. I’m not angry one bit that you’re enjoying a drink together.” Glancing over his shoulder at her father especially, she shook her head. “Although it’s obvious that you and Estel can hold your liquor better than _some_.” Estel was now supporting her father so that he did not topple out of his chair from giddiness. It was not much longer and the same happy old man had fallen asleep with his chin digging awkwardly down to his chest, snorting breaths coming from his nose. At a pleading look from Bryn, Ancalon and Estel both supported the old sire in a familiar two-man hold and took him to the only bedroom in the cottage to lie him down.

They returned to find Brynhilde putting on her winter garb again. “I’m going back to the house to start supper. I don’t mind if you both stay here.” Ancalon opposed this immediately, and soon the rangers both accompanied her to the couple’s home across the way and it was her husband who began making preparations for the meal. Bryn happily sat at the little table beside Estel and they all talked in the comfort of a warm kitchen for a long while, facing toward Ancalon as he fixed the vittles and cooked over their wood stove.

At a lull in their conversation Estel found himself studying Brynhilde as she watched her husband move about. Her hair was a honey blonde that waved and curled, as it would, thick and loosely bound so that most of its weight settled about her neck and over strong shoulders. A few small braids would, by grace, appear in the thick of it when she turned, similar braids he remembered finding in the children of their clan in the north, Ancalon’s doing. Lovely color painted her cheeks from the warmth by the fire and the ruddiness of her winter complexion, brightening eyes already blue as a high mountain lake. Every now and again Ancalon would look at the lady over his shoulder and wink, or gaze unabashedly as she talked and he peeled potatoes.

They adored one another, and he was happy for them. Such loving moments were not often expressed so openly, and it reminded Estel how alone he was upon long journeys and among men who could not know his true name. The polite question came—as he knew it would—of whether or not he had a lover waiting for him among the women of the north, or anywhere else. He thought briefly, painfully, of how he had spoken of love to the half-elven Undomiel, once. Though only a youth, his feelings had been ardent and true, but the daughter of Elrond laughed sweetly and told him such a thing was not to be and her beautiful eyes had been touched with pity for him. Estel only smiled at his friend’s wife, shook his head quietly, and looked away before he could see the same pity in this woman’s gaze.

A long night of good food and friendship was followed by the ranger’s departure early the next morning, little rest to be had for the Dúnedain chieftain who explained he had been commissioned by their friend the Grey to watch over the Shire-folk some distance to the west. It was indeed one of his more pleasant tasks, guarding innocents who were oblivious to such dangers as could be, and he would go surely with a lighter step now that he had enjoyed such fine hospitality. Brynhilde repeated her offer of welcome, should he come their way again, and Ancalon promised his captain that after their child’s birth in the Spring he would come and rejoin the men for a time. Nodding, Estel clasped his ranger’s arm in farewell and then was pleasantly taken in an embrace from the man’s wife, a warm kiss pressed to his bearded cheek and ‘safe journey’ murmured on a frosty morning. Estel made no noise as he left their property and disappeared out of sight.


	4. Four

By June’s warmth, Ancalon was readying to leave for his men and join the rangers, reluctant to depart from his family and more heartened than ever to ensure his safe return so that he might protect them. Brynhilde had nursed and already gone to field when Ancalon donned his gear and told his father-in-law goodbye, walking the familiar path uphill to find his dear wife. Brynhilde stood where she often did, overlooking the flocks, and smiled sadly when she saw her beloved come to meet her. In a sling wrapped across her shoulder their little daughter lay cooing and playing with her fingers.

“Good morning, dear one.” He greeted Bryn with a lingering kiss and brought his hand to the perfect baby, now three months old, who lay against her breast smiling and squirming. Unwrapping the precious bundle, Ancalon took hold of his daughter and lifted the little one high against his chest, touching her reverently and talking sweetly in elvish as her little grey eyes studied him wide and dark-lashed. Already she greatly favored her father.

“I think she knows that fair tongue better than the common one her mother uses.” Brynhilde mused calmly, watching how her husband treated his firstborn.

He glanced sidelong at her and grinned. “I shall teach you both that language. Although it might be best kept between us, so that Audhild cannot know our private talks.” Ancalon’s eyes changed as he turned to Brynhilde and leaned in to kiss her neck, nuzzling her hair. Hair, which the baby was happy to take a handful to yank painfully. “Indeed, to take what privacy we can.” The couple laughed softly and Brynhilde buried her face into his chest, wrapping her arms about him and remembering how thin he had been what seemed long ago when he came to pay her court. The man she held now carried more bulk on his frame; well muscled and content in the life he now shared with her. Would he return so slight and lean again, as the miles ate away at him?

“Take care of yourself, Ancalon.” The soft words were muffled against his jerkin, but the ranger understood them and grasped her tightly to his side.

“I will return, Brynhilde.” Promise echoed in his voice and the words comforted her a little. “It may pass a month before I am able, but I shall come soon as I can.”

Wiping her tears, Brynhilde sought to take a calming breath and reached out to pet the downy hair that graced her daughter’s head. “Audhild will be much changed in a month.”

“Perhaps. Yet Dúnedain blood runs through her, and may slow the swiftness of childhood a little. I certainly hope so, for I cannot bear the thought of this one turning into a young lady.” Gently, Ancalon pressed his stubbled face against the softness of his daughter’s cheek and neck, rubbing a little to blow kisses that made her face twist and sweet laughter to bubble up. “I love you, my _darling_ girl. My Audhild.” A tiny hand, wrinkled with new flesh, touched the light beard of his face and her fingers scratched lightly to feel its strange texture. “Keep yourselves safe, and hidden. Always wear your dagger, Brynhilde, I beg of you.”

Nodding, the woman looked up into his face and knew the time had come for him to leave her once more, but now it felt different. Bryn received his kiss, deepening it and memorizing him, and then he released her to walk away and disappear into the woods. “I love you, Ancalon.” She whispered, and Audhild began to whine and cry.

 

A month came and went, there was no news or sign of Ancalon. September came and Audhild was sitting up, trying her hardest to learn to crawl, and succeeding in some amusing ways. When Brynhilde watched her daughter nurse and fall asleep in her arms, the woman could not hold back her emotion. Ancalon should be with her, seeing his little one grow, sharing moments that would never come again in the ‘firsts’ of Audhild’s life. Ake comforted his daughter as he could, muttering to himself every now and then of Ancalon’s absence, but keeping mostly silent after Brynhilde’s pleading.

The old man loved his granddaughter dearly and played with her as much as he could, often caring for her while Brynhilde looked after the animals. It was one such evening, a pleasant coolness in the air that breathed the coming season, that Ake sat on the porch with his granddaughter while Brynhilde sat in the yard nearby to milk a goat. The woman smiled, nearly closing her eyes to so calmly hear her daughter’s little ‘language’ and her father cooing and laughing gently. Her smile was gone when another sound assaulted that peace. A growl. The goat she had tied up became frantic, bleating loudly, dancing, and kicking before Bryn could quickly cut her loose and let her run off into the pasture.

“Dad, please, can you take Audhild inside?” Her voice was tense, eyes scanning the darkening rims of their wooded yard.

“Darlin, I can’t with her in my arms. Come and take the bairn, then worry about me.” Ake was calm, but knew the seriousness of the threat, still invisible. Quickly, Bryn obeyed, trading him her dagger for the blessedly quiet baby and taking her inside, to the bedroom where she could lay her in the center and not worry for a few moments. Just as she shut the door to that room, the scratching and barking came up on the porch and Ake cried out angrily.

“ _Dad!_ ” Screaming, Brynhilde scrambled in the kitchen for another knife and fled outside to find wolves filling the grassy area coming out of the forest. Two were jumping upon her father who they had knocked over, though one now fell away bloodied by his hand. “Back! _Back!_ ” Yelling for all her might to frighten them off, her presence only drew the others in their pack closer to the house, growling in hunger. Kicking at the wolf upon her father, she shrieked when it whirled on her and bit her leg, roughly tearing her dress and digging into the flesh of her calf.

Grievously wounded, Ake rolled to sit upright and laid hold of the dog’s hind leg, dragging him away from Bryn with attention returned to the frail man so that he might stab the creature and take it down. With two of their brothers lying dead on the porch, the other wolves were cautious to approach now, and gave Brynhilde time enough to frantically drag her father inside, slamming and bolting the door shut. Turning to him again, the woman cried aloud to see how bloodied and pale he was, lying in agony. “Bryn, Brynhilde, my dearest love…” He gasped, reaching for her, and she fell on her knees beside him, hearing her daughter crying softly in her room.

“ _No_ , no, no… Please, tell me what to do.” Sobbing without care, she cradled her father close in her lap, staining herself crimson in the process.

“I love you, little one. You are so like your Momma, I wish she could see you and your family.” His eyes were fond upon her, but then he convulsed in pain, causing more fluid to leave him and drip down over his crippled legs. “I go to her, now, little one.” Gritting his teeth, Ake clutched at her. “You’re strong, love. Stronger than any I’ve seen. So’s that little one of your own, and she’s got it twice over from the two of you.” Looking at her once more, Brynhilde saw the light go out of his eyes as the color had already drained from his face. He was gone in a moment.

Crumpling in tears for only a few moments, Bryn forced herself to stand and went to the bedroom where Audhild curled sniffling and crying from having been left so suddenly alone, completely unharmed. They were locked inside, now, safe enough. She brought the baby close, feeling her hands grasp and release the curls at her neck as she held her tightly, went to pick up the dagger from Ake’s hand and sat in the chair beside the fire. Nothing could be done till morning, until the wolves left off with their fill of goat or boredom, and Brynhilde sat praying that Ancalon would come soon.

The dawn found her curled on the floor around Audhild, blankets upon the baby to shield her from the blood that Bryn had yet to wash off herself. Something roused her, and as she came to the woman jolted upright to hear her name being called in the distance. Carefully taking the baby in her arms, Brynhilde cringed and stepped lightly on the leg that received the bite, feeling light-headed and ill from both pain and the gruesome vision of her father lying dead. Bryn limped past him to the front window, finding no dangers lurking in the early light. Peering out from the front door, opened just a crack, Brynhilde heard her name shouted again, closer this time and more urgently.

Coming out onto the small deck, she searched the woods desperately and called out with her own broken voice. “Ancalon?” Into the clearing came a ranger, and she nearly fainted in relief, but settled to staggering forward out to him. “ _Ancalon…_ ” But it was not he.

Strong arms took her and steadied the woman, distraught and stained in blood that he prayed did not belong to her. Estel looked her up and down, saw the child in her grasp that yet lived, and looked into her face. “Brynhilde, are you hurt? Are you all right? I came upon the wolves hours ago, I followed their tracks…”

“Estel, I cannot… Please, in the house, he is lying there.” Sobbing quietly, the woman leaned heavily upon him and he guided her back to the cottage, the one in which Ake lived. Warily, he eyed the bloody wolves that were cast to the side of the porch and followed the trail of blood, which led to the old man’s half opened door. Sitting the woman gently upon the front step, the ranger pushed wide the door and was met with the garish wounds of the old sire as his body rested where Bryn had obviously dragged him. Kneeling down, Estel kissed his fingers and touched Ake’s head with respect, closing his eyes completely before turning to see Brynhilde weeping quietly as the babe still slept.

Returning to her, his hand came to rest gently at her neck, his sorrow conveyed through such a gesture, until at length their eyes met and he asked her. “Are you and the baby all right? You’re not hurt?” The healer in him checked her over at a glance and found the leg she had favored. “Let me clean this wound, Brynhilde. I would not have it give you a fever, not while you’re tending this little one.” Estel spoke softly, receiving a permissive nod so that he could give her due attention, and soon had her calf cleaned of dried blood and wrapped securely with salve.

Giving a sigh, the man looked up to her and glanced behind to the house where her father lay. “Would you show me where you’d like to bury him?” Nodding again silently, the woman took a deep breath to calm herself, and stood to direct him to a proper place and the tools to dig a grave. Once Estel had divested himself of gear and took to the task, he looked up stunned to find Bryn approaching slowly with the child still asleep in a basket of blankets in one hand, and another shovel in the other. They worked for more than an hour together digging the sire’s grave deep enough. Once, during, her child had begun to fuss and Brynhilde set aside her shovel, climbing out with Estel’s help, she wiped her hands on her skirts and sat down in the grass to nurse the sleepy infant. The ranger stopped to watch her tend the child for a few moments, intrigued, though he knew what it was she did. When she lifted her red-eyed gaze to meet his calmly, no shame in them, the ranger felt himself flush and quickly returned to his work.

A blanket was wrapped around the body and Estel carried him to set at the edge of the grave before he climbed down inside, took him again, and laid him to rest at the bottom. More quiet tears fled from Brynhilde’s eyes as she helped put dirt back into the hole, for she would not watch him do it alone and worked with him until it was done. Pulling the basket that her daughter played quietly in over near her, the young mother sat beside the grave and began to sing in soft and broken tones. While she grieved, Estel took care of removing the wolf corpses that were still scattered on the porch, going up to where he saw the remnants of another burn pile to lay them up and start the fire.

The man was scrubbing blood out of the wood floors when he felt a feminine hand on his shoulder and he turned to look at Brynhilde who knelt beside him with kind eyes. “ _Thank you_.”

He stopped what he was doing and faced her fully, taking her hand in both of his. “Had I been hours earlier, I could have prevented this… For that, I am sorry, Brynhilde.”

She shook her head instantly, grasping tight to his hands. “Do not say that. None of this was your doing. I will not hear any of these things that could be, or should have been, they are not real.” Though she was a little harsh, he did not venture to argue against words that were true. Her thoughts shifted then, it was as though he could see it in her eyes, and she asked him gently. “Do you know anything of Ancalon? Have you seen him?”

Estel sighed, for the summer had been spent guarding the west, while he knew Ancalon and his other rangers ventured east to aid those fighting the enemy. He told her as much, reluctant to have no news of him for her. She nodded, seeming to resolve upon looking at no news as good news. Eager to have her leave this particular spot, and these dark thoughts of loss and loneliness, Estel stood and took her hands to guide her up as well. “Will you not introduce me to the baby? You must remember you were still with child when I met you.” He smiled tenderly, and she returned it, leading him away to her house beyond her father’s.

Audhild had woke from her nap and now played with the blankets that surrounded her on her parent’s bed, welcoming her mother with bright grey eyes and a gummy smile as she was picked up. “This is Audhild, our daughter.” A true smile came to Brynhilde’s face then, and he was glad to see it. The ranger brought his large hand up to stroke her back and the little one turned her face to him, smiling around two fingers she had begun to suck on. The woman bounced her a bit and moved to the bedside where she sat and laid a blanket over her chest and the baby’s head, beginning to nurse again.

“She is beautiful.” He commented, crossing his arms and glancing briefly at the scene he had watched earlier. Watching her breastfeed seemed far too intimate for him to intrude upon, especially since it stirred something in him he could not yet name. Taking a breath, Estel leaned back on the doorframe and looked out the window at the sun in the leaves, thinking about less than pleasing things once again. “You shouldn’t stay here, Brynhilde. Not alone.” Out of the corner of his eye he saw her tense to protest and then withdraw. She knew it was foolish.

He had been thinking of how to help her as he worked and he shared those thoughts with her now, looking at his feet or out the window. “I’ve been moving along the borders of the Shire these last months, guarding, and scouting. On the eastern edge, there are communities that hold a mixture of Men and Halflings… I could take you there; guide you to those who would help.” He chanced a look up at the woman now, gratefully finding her burping the child on her shoulder. “I could _protect_ you. And when Ancalon returns, you would come back to your home here.”

Silent for a long while, Brynhilde stood and came closer to speak with him. “Do you think I can get a good price for my flock?” Estel nodded, seeing the wheels turn in her mind around the idea. “I could buy a small home perhaps, keep a few goats and sheep for their milk and wool…” As she trailed off her eyes ran over the wood floors and walls of her home, noticing details along the way. “Ancalon built this house.” Her words were a sad murmur, her memories filled with her husband and the life they were beginning to build here. But they could return, as Estel said, and perhaps start again. When Brynhilde’s eyes focused again she found Estel regarding her closely, sympathy and something else in his expression. “I will go with you.”


	5. Five

Brynhilde found she settled into the small community very quickly. Mostly hobbits with large families—so many Brandybucks, she could not keep track—and all very curious, but very welcoming to this woman and her little daughter. Many of her flock were sold straight away; leaving the few Bryn would need for her own, and to maintain a little business. And when a few different hobbit lasses realized her skill with wool and weaving, they put her to work with orders and supplied their materials for all sorts of cold weather clothing.

Estel had helped her into the small abode, which was something of a flat on the edge of the village, and then left her to acclimate, wishing to lay low and blend into the background where he could best observe. Only a couple asked about his presence, having seen his hooded figure before in taverns and towns, but never knowing him, and Bryn replied simply that he was a friend of her husband’s, leaving it at that and happily moving on to describe and talk of that husband who she waited for. After being alone so long, with only her father and Ancalon, Brynhilde found herself enjoying the energy and conversation of so many new neighbors. All their ‘troubles’ were so slight, but they made such fuss that you would think every stained blouse was a catastrophe, and the woman smiled, welcoming any and all such dilemmas in lieu of the heartache that lingered as a weight in her chest.

She missed her father and longed for his company that had always been so reliable. Constantly her thoughts went to her husband, who had yet to return or send word, and she fought the ongoing battle of wondering. What was happening to him? Would he return as he’d promised so faithfully? Estel came to her often, arriving through what door she knew not, and visiting only on the evenings when no company came to call and no eye would be watching. It had come to the point that only a look between them both asked and answered the same question: ‘Have you any news of Ancalon?’ ‘No, none.’

When her gaze asked him again this night, winter in full swing and more months gone since Ancalon had last held her, Brynhilde slowly wilted into a kitchen chair and let her head fall in grief. The baby was asleep in the other room and Estel knelt instantly before the distraught woman, her shuddering cries of loneliness made quiet by their depth. Carefully he touched her, his hands supporting her arms until she leant on his shoulders and held him despairingly. “He is _dead_ … he must be dead, Estel. I cannot bear it.”

The rangers hands moved to soothe her, rubbing slowly up and down her back, cradling her head through her hair when sobs pressed her closer still. “We do not know that, Brynhilde. Where my rangers go there is great unrest, his men may be under siege… there are many ways for Ancalon to be alive and unable to come to you.” The woman shook her head against him, but said no more. Estel sighed deeply, wishing he knew what to say to give any lasting comfort.

By now, he was worrying for Ancalon, himself, thinking of the evil that encroached what were once free lands of Gondor and Rohan, let alone the wilderland that his Dúnedain often traversed. Ancalon’s life, and the life of every fighting Man in Middle Earth, was ever in danger… but it was Brynhilde who Estel now worried for most of all. This woman, the wife of a brother-in-arms, had become dear to him, and he feared for her strength. Brynhilde carried so much loss inside her, a loneliness that was not easily dispelled by the company of friends. What she needed was her husband, and that he could not be. There was pain that cut into him along with such a thought.

They lingered in the same position for some time, until Estel knew it would be harder if he waited a moment more. “I am leaving soon, Brynhilde.” He felt her tense in his arms.

He could not know how dreadfully familiar those words were to her. Quelling her heart’s desire to pour forth in tears and plead with him, Bryn slowly loosed her hold about his shoulders and straightened apart from him, wiping sodden cheeks and taking a handkerchief to her nose. When she could breathe a little, she sighed. “I know.”

Still kneeling before the hobbit-sized kitchen chair—a gift for her ‘quite mannish’ abode— Estel took her hands in his and gained her attention once more. “My task is still greatly to guard and watch over the Shire. That requires that I move to hear what I can hear, feel out threats, and rove the surrounding lands. I shall be only a few days’ from here, in any direction I go. Brynhilde…” Hesitating, the man took a breath in resolve. “I cannot promise you what I will find, but I shall make it my priority to garner news of Ancalon. I would not have you lose hope, Brynhilde, you are stronger than you know.”

 

It was a day Brynhilde expected nothing. A little new year gathering was taking place in a nice tavern and she sat among a few hobbit lasses whom’d she made quick friends with, passing around Audhild and taking turns to make the little one laugh. They sat near a warm hearth, cheeks flushed by songs and laughter, the woman had almost loosed hold of her sorrows for a little while until she glanced up and those sorrows took her in a strangling grip. Evening had come, and it almost hid the shadowed figure at the doorway, but Brynhilde recognized Estel even through his hood.

“You’ve gone quite pale, m’dear! Are you well?” The hobbitess beside her—a more motherly figure, who’d taken a liking to Bryn and her daughter—laid her hand on Brynhilde’s arm in concern.

“I, I think I just need a moment of quiet. Will you watch the baby for me, I’ll only be a bit.” The tall woman made her polite excuse before rising to follow after the ranger outside. The frigid air burned her lungs when she tried to take a breath of calm, and chills rose along her arms and legs as she stepped out, eyes searching for him. To her right, back just behind the tavern stood Estel motioning for her.

When she met him he pulled her hands from where her arms had been crossed and held them in his rougher grasp, yet no other could have given a gentler touch. “Brynhilde…” He began haltingly, and already she knew what his words would be. “Your husband has fallen.”

It was a simple statement, a quick answer to a question she had asked on sleepless nights for months and months. Such tears she had already shed in anticipation and foreknowledge of these words of death that Brynhilde now just sighed deeply and experienced that familiar clenching in her chest. Her gaze met the ranger’s as she asked quietly. “How did he die?”

“There are rangers far to the south in Gondor who rove often in Ithillien, defending their country on the borders of Mordor. It is a long journey from here all the way east to those lands, and it was there Ancalon gave his aid. Word does not travel so swift as we would hope, and from my rangers I learnt that he was killed when the leaves began to fall.” Estel noted how recognition and understanding flitted upon her face.

“So these last few months when I… My husband was already gone.” Her voice whispered, as though to herself, and when she closed her eyes the man saw the glimmer of tears caught in her lashes.

“He died in defense of our people; families and innocents whose villages were being raided in the night. Ancalon’s death was noble, protecting those in need.” Bryn nodded at his words, her eyes still shut and hands still secured within his roughened fingers. “Brynhilde, I would honor his bond with you by continuing to watch over you and Audhild. You are under my protection.” He gained her eyes upon him once more and Estel dared to let his heart reveal itself, to show her at least the side of him that desired to provide for her.

A tremulous hand rose to touch his face gently, a gesture of gratitude mixed with weariness. “There is a warm couch by the fire, please go and ease yourself. I will come shortly with the baby.” The woman lingered half a moment holding his face, and then turned to gather Audhild. He sat where she had instructed, though Estel’s posture was stiff as he faced the fire, and quickly he came to his feet when Brynhilde came quietly through the door.

His eyes studied the color on her cheeks where she had been upset, a sharp contrasting rouge to how pale she seemed otherwise. Once she came close to him Estel found his attention brought to the beautiful little girl in her arms, finding Audhild reaching out to him familiarly. Taking her gently, Estel held the baby up against his chest and smiled genuinely, letting her small hands touch his beard and scratch it lightly. Beside him, Brynhilde watched almost the exact scene play in her memory of Ancalon holding their daughter. Her bright tears brought the ranger’s gaze upon her, but they were not her husband’s eyes. It didn’t matter, and Brynhilde found this man’s strong arms would wrap around her in comfort just as completely as Ancalon’s would. A tunic much like her husband’s received her tears.

 

In the weeks to follow Estel did not stray far, looking in on his charges more often than they looked upon him. When he came into their little home the ranger was always welcome, receiving a brave smile from Brynhilde, and typically his arms full of a growing baby girl. While Estel played and talked with Audhild, praising her beauty and tenderly kissing and tickling the child, the man took note of Bryn’s hasty removal from their scene, keeping busy with some other task until they all joined for a meal.

By other observations the widow seemed to be grieving properly and in balance, coming to accept Ancalon’s absence better, indeed, than all the months of not knowing one way or another. They spoke of her late husband in reverent and fond conversations, and Brynhilde relished in the stories Estel shared with her of their growing up among the Dúnedain. Something he said one evening sparked a question from her, and Bryn inquired of it as her daughter settled to sleep tucked into her bosom. “You said you had been there many years before Ancalon could have started his training, I had thought the two of you of similar age?”

Shaking his head, he peered up at the woman. “He told you, did he not, of the long-lived Dúnedain?”

Nodding, she shrugged and smiled to think of their first conversation in this subject. “Yes, and I did not believe him that he was forty when we married. He looked no older than me, and I was twenty-three.”

Estel smiled also and admired the return of her bright blue eyes and color on her cheeks, remembering how it had been when he first met her a year ago. “His blood was of my kindred, though not as strong as in my line. I carry eighty-five years upon my back.” Though there was surprise in her expression, he was intrigued to find her more thoughtful than in any true shock.

“Your line?” He realized what she detected now. “Then you are of noble blood, Estel. And I’ve always seen it in your bearing, and assumed it is because you have the status of a chieftain… but it is more than that, isn’t it? Your blood is stronger.” Bryn’s manner was not accusing, but held the energy of discovery and respect along with her finding.

Estel bowed his head, debating, but resolved after some moments that he knew this woman well above most others and could trust her with this. “You are as discerning as the Istari, Brynhilde. There are few who have guessed my heritage, and few whom I have told, but I will tell you now.” He took a deep breath, filled with resignation, but also some relief that he could be entirely open. “Estel many know me by, and it is not a false name, for it was given to me by the elves with whom I was raised when my mother sought their refuge of Rivendell. I am Aragorn, son of Arathorn, and Isildur’s heir to the throne of Gondor.”

The words held more weight than seemed the room was able to accept, but Brynhilde looked at him carefully, a keen light in her eyes as she regarded him now. “Why are you here? Why are you not in Gondor, in Minas Tirith where the stewards have long reigned?”

Their conversations had rarely ventured to such worldly subjects, and Aragorn found her no ignorant country lass, to discuss such things and hold a blank stare in her eye. She knew well of what she said, and held a learned demeanor of a noble lady. The fact of this drew him to her even more. “The sword of Elendil, which would serve as the true sign of my kingship, is broken long ago in battle with the Dark One. There are evils and temptations of such power that my forebears did not have strength enough to withstand… I do not wish to succumb to such darkness and greed, to endanger this world with the powers I might gain.” His gaze had strayed to the fire burning in her stove, but now it returned to the woman who still studied him. “I would not take the throne and bring death to my people.”

Silence reigned for a few minutes as they sat together in thought. Finally Aragorn felt the gentle touch of Brynhilde’s hand upon his arm and he found her eyes steady and understanding as they looked into his. “There are many things I do not know, that I have no right to force you to explain… I see you have lived long in turmoil over this before coming to such a decision, and I would not dissuade you, for should you become king of Gondor then I would never see you again.” Half a smile turned her lips as it turned his, though such expressions were stained with sadness. “But I will say this once, and only talk of it if you come to me with such words again.” The hand upon his forearm moved and he felt, with pleasure, her long fingers touch his bearded face and come to hold his chin. “You are a man worthy of honor, and I would follow you, king or not.”


	6. Six

Audhild was so close to walking, now, giving her mother a fright every time she stood in the middle of the room wobbling on unsteady, but preciously chubby legs. Spring had thawed the earth and so Brynhilde would let the child crawl and pull up to things outside with her as she tended the few goats and sheep in her care, feeling safer to have her daughter fall upon soft grass rather than their hard floors inside. Milking one of the goats and watching Audhild at the same time, Bryn did not notice Aragorn standing near to her until a little goat kid frolicked up to him and head-butted his legs playfully. Continuing her chore, the woman turned her head and greeted him with a smile that he returned before they both looked back at the little girl standing with a little bit of balance at last.

Audhild’s curls were growing just enough to let her seem almost like a hobbit child, and they bounced when she toddled around and saw the ranger crouched a small distance away. Her entire face brightened and, giggling, her excited arms threw her off kilter and promptly she fell back to sit on her rump. Far from dissuaded, and smiling to show off the few teeth she’d grown, the baby crawled determinedly for Aragorn and stuttered her breath in excitement as his large fingers guided her to stand before him. Laughing, the man swept her up and tossed her a few times, delighting in her own changing laugh until his strong arms cradled her close to his chest and shoulder so that she might recover.

As they cuddled, Aragorn murmured sweet endearments in elvish and stroked her back. After a peaceful moment, however, he watched Brynhilde pass them by hastily with her pail of milk, not glancing their way once and seeming upset. Pressing a warm kiss to the child’s cheek, he set the little one down and handed her a small wooden toy he had been carving for her, rising again to go after her mother. “Brynhilde? Is there something wrong?” He came into the small house after her and found the woman bracing her arms on the counter, bucket of milk sloshed and sitting in a puddle beside her.

When she turned to him tears were staining her cheeks and her eyes were in a state. She tried to wipe them dry and shook her head. “I’m not upset, I’m just… I’m happy and I’m sad.” Aragorn came nearer and she allowed him to hold her hands. “You love her the same way Ancalon loved her.” Her voice broke a little at this admission, but she went on. “Everything you do with Audhild, the way you hold her to your chest, the fair words you speak… it is what Ancalon would have done, and how he would have wanted our daughter to be loved.”

The ranger touched her face fleetingly before pulling the woman into a gentle embrace, letting her cry a little. “I do not seek to replace your husband.”

“I know.” She whispered, and then lifted her eyes to him. “Yet you fill a place that would have been left empty for my daughter. You are very selfless in your love for her, Aragorn, and I cannot express my gratitude for it.” Bryn took a deep breath and pressed her cheeks to wipe the tears, managing a forced smile as she pulled away from him. “I’m fine. I’ll be all right. Go and play with her, she’s missed you.”

“Brynhilde…” He held her arm still, but with a truer smile and troubled eyes, Bryn waved him off and reassured him that she just needed a quiet moment to right herself. Caught between the desire to give comfort—seeing the pain of loss in her ebb and flow as it had since he found her among the wolf carcasses—and to remain with Audhild and do as she bid, Aragorn sighed and watched the woman retreat into her bedroom. Often he forgot that Brynhilde was still so young, but experience and trial added years onto her bearing; a weight he was long familiar with carrying. The deaths of loved ones seemed to heap age upon the living. The man wanted nothing more than to ease her burden, but he felt it was still not the time.

When Brynhilde emerged better recovered sometime later, her tears spent for a time and face washed afresh, she came out to find Estel reclined with one arm behind his head and the other hand protectively set upon the sleeping baby on his chest. Both of them slept quietly and, though she had seen the ranger asleep before, Bryn could not remember his face looking so young and at ease. Coming on soft steps, the woman sat in the armchair beside them and watched in lovely silence, hearing the fire eat away at a new log and night bugs chirp their background music outside.

No doubt sensing her presence, somehow, Aragorn’s eyes slowly opened and shifted until they caught sight of her. It struck him as she came into focus, to find her watching him so steadily with the same belgard that had colored his own gaze more times than he could count. Estel felt he dare not move, else he shatter this moment that suddenly seemed so precious and full of hope, and so they shared a gaze that drifted from calm admiration, to love.

Brynhilde drew her legs up beneath her and leaned an arm upon the chair, her eyes flitting now and then to look with adoration upon her daughter. “What do you say to her, when you speak in elven tongue?” Her voice was half-whisper, more afraid—as he was—to ruin this tender moment than to really wake the babe.

Aragorn’s keen eyes did not leave her as he answered. “I tell her she has the beauty of her mother.” He watched her turn her face away modestly, though her lovely eyes smiled in thanks. “I tell her she must smile and laugh, give you the joy you deserve.”

Smiling fondly, Bryn took the wood-carved toy he had set aside and studied it absently. “Audhild listens well to your words.” With care, she stroked the lines of mane and tail Aragorn had lovingly carved into the play piece and, holding it up, the woman admired his work. “This is beautiful. She will treasure this until she is old enough to ask me for her own horse.” They laughed quietly and again landed appreciative eyes upon the other.

“Perhaps we can find a suitable pony once she is tall enough.” The man murmured and glanced down to the precious weight on his chest, changing his hold on her with care.

The familiarity of this conversation warmed Brynhilde, it felt to her as though Aragorn had always been with them, and that discussing a sweetly mundane future with Audhild was commonplace. “You shall have to be the one to teach her horsemanship, Estel, for I’ve never been on one. Seen them just enough to admire, heard my father’s stories, but the few I’ve known are only gentle pullers of carts and ploughs.” For a little while they spoke of the steeds he had known, and their riders, the great horse-masters of Rohan with their war-chargers as loyal as any brother-in-arms.

Regarding her thoughtfully, Aragorn mused. “I should like to see you on the back of a fleet horse, Brynhilde. It would suit you well, I think.”

Scoffing lightly, the woman shook her head. “A shepherdess is not suited to be a horse-woman. Leave me to my kids and bleating sheep.” The words resolved to be content with a small life, but Aragorn saw her eyes spoke differently, lit with a freshness of young life that grief had aged and smothered for a time. Such looks filled him with an unnamed, but well-known longing.

After some moments Brynhilde stood and stretched her limbs, coming over to him and rubbing her palm firmly over her daughter’s rounded back. “Come, darling girl.” Her voice was soothing and motherly, but not so quiet as before, now trying to rouse the little one. “If you go on sleeping now, you’ll make no rest to be had by your momma tonight.” Slowly, Audhild began to respond and stir upon the man’s chest, feeling both her mother’s touch and then Estel’s come to join hers. The stronger, larger hands of the ranger took her up as he stood and bounced her a little before handing the baby off to Bryn. “Come, Audhild, are you hungry? Let’s have a little sup before milk and good nights, hm?” Her voice was calm and loving, and Aragorn was content to listen to her as he added a few pieces onto the fire.

They ate a light meal together, all around one corner of Brynhilde’s already small table, and talked of nothing with smiling eyes. Audhild talked quietly to herself, and in her own language, gumming around the mashed veggies that her mother continually spooned back into her mouth. Aragorn volunteered to clean the baby’s face once her eyes began to droop for the evening, taking her into his lap with a warm washcloth to do a better job and allow her little body to go slack against his arm. Wordlessly, Brynhilde took a small bottle of milk and gathered her daughter from him into the cradle of her own arms, watching as she sleepily began to suckle.

Quiet now, the only words voiced were brief musings upon the storm that seemed to be on its way that night. “Will you wait here, tomorrow, if the rain comes?” Brynhilde subtly invited him to stay, but quickly added. “If there are no pressing matters you must take your leave for.”

Aragorn smiled with his eyes, only just curling his lips to show his pleasure and inclining his head, accepted. “I think I could spare a day, if you would permit me to stay tonight.” The woman answered with a warm smile, and in a moment it was clear the baby had given up the fight to stay awake. He could not keep his gaze away from the young mother as she stood and laid the child at her shoulder to rub slowly up and down her back, thinking that these simple moments would keep him warm on long, dark days ahead. “Will you let me lay her down?” The ranger stood and drew near to her, resting his callused hand over the feminine one around the baby.

Brynhilde nodded and easily moved Audhild’s limp form from her embrace, then curling into Estel’s, and smirking at the shuddering little breath the child took as she settled against him. Holding her tenderly, and very close, his low voice began singing the soft words of an ages-old song Brynhilde could not interpret, but felt she understood. As he went to put Audhild to bed, Bryn trailed slowly behind and listened to the gentle voice crooning to her daughter, waiting just outside the bedroom and leaning against the wall so she wouldn’t intrude.

Aragorn’s words were quiet, for the babe slept on after he’d tucked her little body in among the blankets, yet he spoke as though conversing with Audhild in elvish. Every now and again he paused and stroked the dark curls that grew a little thicker now, gazing with true affection and longing at her sweet lashes and lips parted in innocent rest. He laid his large hand upon her for a moment, feeling her belly rise in breath, and then brushed a light kiss on the baby’s head before he rose and quietly met her mother in the adjoining room.

The lady’s eyes were closed as she leaned by the doorframe, but soon opened when Aragorn came to stand very near and she recognized that ardent look of belgard again in his grey eyes. He looked poised to speak, and so Brynhilde said nothing, gazing on his face more closely than she could study him most of the time. Years had tanned his skin and given lines at his eyes and jaw that would never smooth, while small white marks and scars told her of many of dangers and struggles, but the piercing grey eyes that looked upon her now held a light that was discerning, both wise and young.

Right now those eyes watched her through the same proximity and seemed to weigh for him the right words he should voice. With reverence, Estel took one of her hands that had been wrapped about her waist and held it with the tenderness she had come to learn a ranger’s rough hands possessed. “I’ve no right to ask anything of you, and so I would say this and hold you to no debt.” He shook his head and looked at her seriously, waiting until she gave him some small sign of consent. “When I first met you with Ancalon, I held you in my heart as a sister, and it was with respect to Ancalon and my own conscience that I brought you here.” With a sigh, his eyes fell from hers and landed upon their hands together. “I do not know when that changed to what I feel now. You are lovely in every way, and there is strength in your grace that draws me to you, Brynhilde. When I am with you and Audhild I feel stirrings that I had long thought the life I lead would have forsaken. They stir me to long for a daughter, for a companion… for a lover.”

He stopped then, and once more a grave expression met hers, Brynhilde thought she saw his eyes almost haunted with guilt, though they betrayed his longing by how they looked over her face. “I do not seek to replace your husband.” Estel repeated his words from earlier and the woman understood them differently now, though they were still spoken in earnest.

In fact, Brynhilde understood all of his words perfectly, and smiled gently, not in any way making light of his solemnity. The hand that held hers she now took in both hands and beckoned quietly. “Come sit with me.” Brows furrowed, he followed her like an obedient child led by the hand, sitting beside her on the couch and facing forward while she turned to face him. Their hands were still together between them. “I know you do not want to replace Ancalon. You cannot.” Emotion took hold for a moment over her voice, but Aragorn’s fingers tightened around hers and she recovered. “You are different men, and there is no fear of that. The way you speak of your heart’s change is familiar, for it is how I have described my own, of late.”

Aragorn now lifted his face to see her and a strange hope lingered, tentative in his gaze. Guardedly, he pressed. “You do not say so in thanks for protection, or my love for Audhild?”

“My feelings have _stemmed_ from admiring your care of us, and your love for my daughter… but I do not love you out of guilt or debt, as you seem to fear.” The woman looked kindly at him, seeing how difficult it was to convince this ranger that her heart was truly answering the call of his own.

“You speak easily in answer to something I have struggled long in admitting to you. I feel I am wrong at this time, that perhaps your season of mourning has not yet gone…”

“With every concern you voice, you honor me to think so carefully on this, Aragorn.” Leaning forward, Brynhilde touched the scruff of his jaw and smiled, taking a deep breath. “We have no need for haste, and you have done right in speaking openly with me, for we are not children to play games of love. It is a high responsibility upon your shoulders—no doubt among many other weights resting there—that you desire to take a wife and daughter both at once.”

“I would not do so, if I did not love you both with my all.” He said humbly, his eyes lowered. Turning to face her fully now, Aragorn held her by the wrist at his neck and gripped her firmly, a fraction of his strength that she knew could claim lives. There seemed a fire behind his eyes that turned them silver in the evening lights and kindled something in her, as well. “I mean to marry you, Brynhilde, and take your daughter as my own. I do not think of anything but I consider how it will concern you and Audhild… _I love you._ ” Tilting his head, he drew her arm to his lips and pressed a fervent kiss to her open palm, closing his eyes to savor it and move slowly down her wrist.

Brynhilde, also, delighted in these first moments of affection, withholding herself long enough so that she met Estel’s passionate eyes before pressing herself into him and kissing the ranger for the first time. His shoulders quaked with a gentle laugh of surprise and then the man’s arms were around her, holding her fast against him as he dedicated himself to a deeper, intended kiss. She smelled of milk and fresh baked bread, and he, of pinesap and leather. Brynhilde’s fingers twined through his hair and scratched lightly against his scalp, drawing what could almost be called a purr from the man’s chest and throat. With difficulty she freed her lips from his, yet strayed only to rest her head at his neck and hold onto him and he cradled her close. “We have a lot of talking to do.” Voice breathless, Brynhilde smiled against the scruff of his neck and felt his hand move through her hair lovingly.

“We certainly do.”


	7. Seven

“ _Brynhilde—!_ ” It was night, and if the front of her small house were not built right to the edge of the street, she would not have heard the horseman’s words as he halted his steed before her door. Bryn had been cuddling her daughter by the fire before bed, and now sat up a little to listen again. And again, the man called her in his quiet, urgent voice. “ _Brynhilde, please._ ”

Not a little alarmed, the young mother hurried to lay the baby down in the bedroom and shut the door, picking her dagger up along the way and clutching it between the folds in her skirt. She opened the door a pinch and peered out to see a ragged man with hood drawn low sitting hunched upon a panting horse. “What do you want, sir? It is too late for proper business, please come back tomorrow.” Her voice guarded, Brynhilde did not take the risk of coming out to see the man more clearly.

There was a suppressed moan from the figure, something murmured like a prayer or a curse in the fair tongue, and the man cast his hood off with a jerk of his head to reveal Estel’s face, his eyes filled with pain. “ _Brynhilde, help me down_.”

Instantly, she rushed out her door, leaving it open to the night, and came up beside the smaller horse. Her back was strong and her arms took hold of the ranger as he gasped quietly and leaned on her to dismount, holding her shoulder too tightly. He was sweaty and breathing with obvious pain, making it a struggle to drag him limping alongside her into the house. Deposited on the couch, Bryn quickly shut the door and then ran into the kitchen to set out some water to boil and the few herbs Estel had brought and begun to teach her their uses. She returned to him with rags and saw the extent of his wounds now that the firelight brought them into relief.

Steeling herself, Brynhilde started to disrobe where rips and tears exposed his blood and the claw marks from animals she knew too well. The smell of herbs filled the house as she worked to clean the blood, both fresh and dried, calming him a little and helping her to focus with her sutures on his belly and then to his leg. His right knee was swollen and Aragorn guided her hands there at the bend and beneath his calf. “Do you feel a pulse there?”

After a moment, she answered with a nod, and then her brows knit with worry. “You cannot feel it?”

Tense, he barely shook his head and leaned back to let out a slow growling breath. “A wolf rammed into my knee and dislocated it, but before the attack was done it had righted itself. I cannot feel below my knee, but if you feel my heartbeat there, then it will heal.” Carefully, Bryn moved up and brushed her wet cloth across the sweat of his face, following it with cool fingers and watching his jaw clench in an effort to smile. With his instruction as to the amount she went away to the kitchen and brewed a tea to ease the intensity of his pain, returning to bind his wounds with clean cloth and leaves wrapped where he showed her. “I am sorry to make you do this, Brynhilde.” The tremor in his voice was what worried her the most.

Gently, she touched his bearded cheek and shook her head. “It may be selfish, but I am glad you came here. To wait while you are hurt and healing somewhere I cannot reach, that is what I dread.” Her other hand lay on his chest and Aragorn covered it with his own, stroking her fingers now stained with blood to match his own. Leaning down to kiss his temple, Bryn smiled sorely at the man, hating to see his suffering, and turned away to pour the tea that would help. “It’s hot.” The warning accompanied her hands around his to hold a shallow bowl of tea, letting him sip a little from the strong brew.

A soft whine came from the bedroom and soon Audhild could be heard crying pitifully in bed. Aragorn met her eye and touched her neck in a gentle caress. “Go to her.” After she’d gone Aragorn heard her steps and the soothing noises of an experienced mother, and before long the baby was quieted.

Brynhilde came back to his side to find the bowl of tea drained and Aragorn’s head laid back with his eyes screwed shut. With her hands now washed clean, they were cool when she touched her fingers to his brow and felt warmth, but no fever as yet. Settling beside him the woman kept her hand on him somewhere at all times, moving from brushing his fingers, holding his arm, stroking his face and neck, until it felt to her as though her beloved warrior was out of danger for the present.

It was late when she felt a tender hand fingering through her hair from crown to nape, and Bryn realized she had drifted to sleep leaning on the cushion near his hip. She looked up to find her beloved’s head tilted and his eyes dark as he gazed on her, and she touched his arm familiarly. “How do you feel, Estel?”

“Well enough. There’s nothing to be done till morning, at least.” The man’s voice was quiet, and he did not cease his attention to her. “You should take your rest, Brynhilde. There are a few hours, yet, that you can enjoy with Audhild in bed.”

But her head shook and the woman moved to sit at his side facing the wounded man, his arm around her waist and her hand on his chest. “I’d rather spend those hours with you. There seem so few that we’re together.”

He smirked, exhaustion weighing upon him, but his fingers tickled the small of her back lazily. “Then it is my turn to be selfish, and say that I want you as close to me as is proper.” Aragorn rested his head back again and watched her come hovering just above his face, a few curls tickling his chin where they spilled over her shoulder. Moved greatly by the love he felt in her gaze, the ranger could not keep his tongue still and so confessed gently. “You have my heart, Brynhilde.”

The murmur of his words played warmly upon her lips and she smiled, drawing nearer. “And gladly do I give you mine, Aragorn.” Bryn whispered softly, brushing her lips against his, caressing his beard, his eyebrows, and his closed eyes with gentle touches. They kissed very slowly, sighing and breathing in the herbs of healing and tasting the tang of blood that still lingered from a bruised and bitten lip.

His strong arm encircled her, pulling the lady close into his side as he let out a quiet, frustrated groan. “It’s not time.” Aragorn turned his face away just enough to break their kiss, and studied Brynhilde’s eyes shut in the memory of pleasure. She did not resist him, and it was this that gave him a trembling grip on his control. “The things I long to do with you are such, only a husband has the right to do with his wife.”

Brynhilde’s smile was calm, but it revealed the livening embers within her eyes. “Then when shall we be married, Estel? I am ready to be your wife.”

To hear those words from her lips filled the ranger with love and pride in this beautiful woman. “I would have us be hand-fasted tomorrow if I were able to stand.” His hand tangled in her dark honey hair affectionately.

“Then we shall eagerly wait while you heal. For I expect not only for you to stand, but to do many _other_ things once you become my husband, Estel.”

“And gladly will I do your bidding, my lady.”

 

Several days passed in the sweet season of betrothal before it was brought to Brynhilde’s mind to ask her ranger where he had encountered his peril of wolves. This morning her daughter played sitting just outside the open back door where Estel and Bryn could easily see her from in the kitchen, providing ample entertainment whenever a neighboring kitten chose to see what she was about. With a few minutes of the ranger not answering her, Brynhilde had almost gone back to giving her full attention to her daughter and playmate.

“I was at your home.” His voice, as ever, was quiet and commanded her notice. There was regret and sorrow in his grey eyes. “I had gone there to check the property, to see your father’s grave, and to know the dangers that might have taken it. And the wolves have frequented there, I saw their markings and worn paths… you cannot return there.”

The woman was silent as he explained, but she reached her hand over the table and took his. “That is not my home anymore. It was full of wonderful memories, but also terrible ones. It is just a place.” Brynhilde smiled at him genuinely, and he marveled at her contentment. “You and Audhild are my home and hearth, Estel. I do not wish to return to the past.” His response was to run his fingers along her palm and wrist, tender touches that matched his gaze.

The moment was interrupted by a knock at the front of the house, and Aragorn sat up in alert. Without much thought, Brynhilde rose to answer her door and was greeted by a kind neighbor woman who lived with her brother and his wife across the street and often bought milk and cheese. “Hello Gert.” Bryn greeted her pleasantly, but kept her door only half-open, not inviting her in this time. “What can I do for you?”

“Hi Brynhilde, I don’t need any dairy today, thank you. Might come by morn after next. We saw your husband’s home, and I know you want to spend time with him, but we thought you might like a rhubarb pie that Isolde and I made.” The young woman shrugged with the dish in her hands and happened to peek over Bryn’s shoulder to catch a glimpse of this mysterious husband.

Smiling, Brynhilde took the gift and touched her arm sweetly. “You are very kind, Gert. Please thank Isolde for me, as well. I shall see you in a few days, then?”

Taking her cue, Gert nodded with a blush and turned away to go across the street again. Brynhilde was met with a raised brow and a little concern on the face of her betrothed. “What?” She returned to him and set the pie between them on the table, taking off its cloth to admire a lovely crust.

“How long have they thought me your husband?” He was rather serious in his manner, but Brynhilde was not so grave, though she confessed.

“I imagine only since your arrival with these wounds. You are discrete, and every other visit you’ve come from the yard and in secret.” Her answer was only in part, and Aragorn’s eyes were steady upon her until she caught his gaze again and sighed. “I have never told anyone that I am widowed. When people have asked after my Audhild’s father, I only explain that he is often away, and moved us here for our safety. I never told them of Ancalon, and I’ve never told them of you.”

“You would have, perhaps, received more help from these people if they knew you to be a widow, Brynhilde.” Looking at her intently, he tried to convey how he thought that would have been her benefit.

“And I would have been an obtainable _wife_ , prey to advances I did not desire. I preferred it to be believed that I was in possession of a man to protect my property and honor… And I _am_ in possession of such a man.” She looked at him warmly and he reached over again to take her hand.

Lifting her hand, Aragorn kissed it and let his cheek rest there. “You always were.”


End file.
